CARDIO-FIT
After the basketball players had left, it was a good half hour before the cardio group would arrive. So Ben surfed the internet for a while, then looked at the timetable for the school classes and their teachers and internalized the house rules again.
Georg had been employed at the gymnasium for 30 years and had suggested him that he might want to redesign the notice board. The headings on the notice board, such as School, Club and Information, looked very worn and could be replaced. And since Georg had nothing to do with computers, this task suited Ben. Nothing was easier for him than re-labeling these boards. Perhaps the pinboard could also be replaced with a completely new magnetic board? The cork had also seen better days and was already crumbling out of its frame in some places.
While Ben was looking for pinboards and magnetic boards on the Internet, the doorbell rang. Ben was surprised, got up and went into the foyer. Five older men were standing in front of the door with their umbrellas, waiting. Ben opened the door and looked at the men in astonishment.
"Good evening. Come in, it's open."
"Good evening! Why is it open? It's usually locked on Monday evenings, isn't it?" asked the man standing at the front.
"I don't know anything about that," Ben replied,"I'm sure my colleague forgot to tell me," he smiled.
"No problem, you can lock up now. But in a way that we can get out again," laughed the man and the other men with him.
They walked past Ben and he locked the door so that they could open the door to the outside, but couldn't get in from the outside. He noticed a flyer for Carnival on the pin board and took it down, after all, Carnival was long over. He went through the other changing room for gentlemen so as not to disturb the men. The two men's changing rooms were connected by the showers. The doors to the showers were both open and one of the men noticed Ben and shouted:"Young man, not so fast."
Ben faltered, hesitated briefly and looked through the shower door into the changing room, where the man who had called him was sitting on a bench. He waved Ben over:"Come over here, so I won't have to shout." He walked through the showers and gave the men a friendly look.
"So, you're the new guy?" the man with the brown hair and full beard asked him.
"Yes, I'm the new guy, Ben Wieberg."
"Good evening Ben, or Benjamin?" asked a white-haired man on the other side of the bench.
"Benjamin, actually, but Ben's all right too."
"We're the cardio-fit group. Always the same five people, sometimes two or three more. But we're actually always there. I am Uwe. That's Heinz, Bernd, Friedrich and Karlchen."
The four men greeted him and made themselves noticeable when Uwe called them by name.
"Nice to meet you," Ben commented, nodding.
"We always come on Mondays and do our cardiac exercises," said Heinz, a short, fat man who resembled a small hedgehog with his gray, short-cropped hair.
"Cardiac exercises?" asked Ben.
"Yes, we are all patients who have had a heart attack or suffer from a general heart weakness. We do sport to keep fit and do something for our circulatory system...", explained Uwe.
But Ben could no longer concentrate on the conversation. Bernd, who was sitting on the bench behind Heinz and Uwe in Ben's direction of view, had been smiling at him the whole time and was now starting to take off his unde
